Best Comeback

Overheard during a coversation between two people. They obviously love each other dearly..

"Yeah, well when I look at you, I doubt I could even eat the amount of food I want to vomit."

Genius.

I Eat Spam

Do you know him? His email address is lesjones@uole.com, so I'm guessing his name is Les Jones. If you know him, or know someone that knows him, either kick him yourself, or get them to kick him for me. Kick him squarely in the centre of his man. And when he is doubled over, not sure whether to vomit or faint, kick him again in the centre of his man. Then take a photo. Send me the photo and I'll buy you dinner to the value of $13.95. I'll take the photo out to dinner with us and use it as a napkin. When I go to pay I won't be suprised if the maitre 'd has seen the napkin/picture and says that this one is on the house sire. Why thank you, I will reply.

If you don't know Les Jones, feel free to hunt him for me.

An easier solution to this whole thing would be to get a better spam filter but I hate this webophirical Mr Jones. And I will not be satisfied with rational behaviour.

Then again, when am I ever?

A Winter's Turning

My mind is on other things. I'm sorry. It's not you, it's me... hell, it's not me, it's you. Why are you looking at me like that? Where did you put the dog? What's that in your canoe? Is that a glue gun in your hand?

These and other conversational gems have all been gathering dust in my relationship repertoire as I bounce contentedly bachelouresque along my life. One day, one day I swear I'll be lucky enough to meet a woman who knows. Her name will be exotic and she will smell of flowers and insence and potatoes and she shall tolerate my shortcomings, enjoy my long comings and then callously break my heart by leaving me for Hillary Clinton.

And then I shall be in the position that I have been longing to be in. I can finally turn and ask,"Pardon me Celeste, but what is that in your canoe? And where did you put the dog?"

And then, as she leaves I shall crumble. Broken. Alone. And she shall not turn, not glance, no island in her eyes, no salvation here. I crumble.

Love, even imaginary smittenish love, is a cruel game.

I wish I played better.

A Woman Who Knows...

It has come to my attention that I require a woman who knows.

Most of my close friends are women who know. Even my male friends are, in part, women who know - or at least they are lucky enough to have succesfully convinced a woman who knows that they are viable material for nights on the couch and sweet mutterings. I hate my male friends.

I am competant, dare I say it (I dare, I dare) at many things. Home renovation is not one of them (as evidenced by previous blog post). Fortunately the knocking of holes, fitting of eletrical thingies, banging of nails and hanging of pictures is not a challenge that one comes up against very often.

Quiche I am not competant at. This saddens me. I realise real men don't eat quiche but I like it and I don't care if it makes my wrists fat.

There is a woman who knows who assured me that quiche is easy. But it requires pastry. When I wrenched my trusty Edmonds Cookbook from my pantry I discovered seven different recipes for pastry. I was shocked and appalled to discover that to make one's own pastry requires 'cold hands'.

Lacking a thermometer, I headed to the supermarket where I found a large chunk of ready made pastry that looked like the thigh of a corpse. I also found a replacement set of screwdrivers. They are awesome.

I can remember as a kid my mother rolling pastry. She made it look very easy. However she never tried to roll pastry with an empty wine bottle. The neck of the bottle proved to be a good handle. The bottom, not so much. And proper rolling pins don't come with a label that comes off in little pieces on your pastry. Church Road Pastry anyone?

Transferring the pastry to the pan that was serving as a pastry dish was an activity that made me glad I wasn't in the Big Brother house. My floor was greedily devouring each delicate driblet of goodness that came its way. But eventually all was done and I gently folded it into corners and baked it blind as Edmonds had told me to do and I mixed a $400 block of cheese and a $200 pottle of cream and many other expensive ingredients that other people who don't live in Herne Bay can't afford and poured them onto my half baked pastry and returned my quiche creation to its furnace and I sat with a glass of Church Road Chardonnay to watch my creation become quiche.

And turn it did. A gleeful embarressment of curdled feelings, cheese and cream.

I need a woman who knows.

Show Me Your Beaches

A few million years ago our ancestors hauled themselves out of the sea and lay panting on the beach. Every summer - not at this moment however, that would be retarded - we head back and do the same thing. I'm thinking of summer holidays past, the beach, the sun screen. the late afternoon drinks, the wine, the accidentally seeing a friends boob... It's a pilgramige. It's elemental. Earth and water. Water and earth. Boob and sand...

The beach itself is not such a hospitable place. Dead jellyfish to the left, seagull carcass to the right, run-aground catamaran straight ahead, boobs behind you...

And yet, despite all this, year after year we return to the beach and certain people embrace the sun and the heat like reptiles. They baste and bake and lie content in the knowledge that cancer is sexy. Toes wriggle and bodies writhe, for the beach is a sensual place. The beach is a place of flesh.

Small people run in the shallows, squealing and yelling. They build things made of sand, they fight and they bury their parents. They will spend much of the next 15 years doing the same thing.

It's the teenagers who are most in tune with the beach. Whether they be in wetsuits, or fancy new sand resistant outfits, they will parade the lean and the taut. They will shriek and laugh and play and shriek some more. Then they will play some more in thigh deep water and make you feel inadequate. From the beach they look like seals.

Then they plunge and swim a few strokes. Becoming instantly bored. There is no goal here for them. They cavort up the sand to collapse on novelty oversized beach towels. Those older, wiser and carrying more baggage look on.

Over the course of any year we gather things that we consider important. We get money, status and cars and pants. At the beach we remove ourselves of all these. The beach is good for us.

The beach is the edge of the world. On the horizon a ship with sails that beckon is held by the afternoon sun. A dog, black against the tide, barks through the waves. It is a happy dog. Not wearing pants. Because dogs don't wear pants. It's barking means nothing. Just as the sun, the sea, the sand, the water and the air, the dog just is.

At times like these here in glorious Auckland I miss the beach.

And the boobs.

Therapy

Therapy is good. Therapy is in. The dirty old Yanks got it first but by sweet baby Jesus when the Yanks say jump coz it's good for you, we jump like a bean made in Mexico.

Just like you I want to go to a trim, mature, smartly dressed, sympathetic woman who has a hint of a middle European accent, and I want to lie down on her couch and I want to burst into tears. 'Help me,' I weep. 'I am small and feeble and thirty three and pink. Help me.'

She says nothing.

I let rip. I explode in her consulting room. I burst like an over-ripe pimple. Self pity and regret drip onto her off-white carpet. My shame and self loathing colour the walls a pale yellow.

She says nothing.

'For God's sake,' I scream, 'can't you see, it's all gone horribly wrong. Therapist, mother, Therapist-Mother, mend my aching soul, my fear, my crippled feelings, my dishonesty. Shake me. Let me step forth into tomorrow, resolute and honest. Let me tell those that tell me what to do not to tell me what to do. Let me tell the beautiful that they are indeed beautiful. Let me hug people and laugh and sing and assemble outdoor furniture and then put food on that outdoor furniture and then eat that food with friends that I will laugh and sing with. Then we shall sleep the sleep of the just and wake refreshed. Teach me to live Therapist-Mother, won't you teach me to live?'

Half an hour of this blubber and I feel just dandy. I bounce from the couch. I seize her cool hand. On an impulse I hug her, feeling the ridges of her straight spine. I slightly dislodge her spectacles. She gives me a warm understanding smile. But she says nothing.

At tthe desk outside sits a young woman with a stopwatch and a box of tissues. She presents the stopwatch. 'Thirty threee minutes today Mr House, at $7.50 is... lets call it $250.' Lets's call it $300,' I sing, handing her crisp new bills fresh from a friendly cash machine and snatch a tissue as you never know when you might need one. We part with a smile, her with the cash, me with the tissue, and a full heart and clear eyes.

It's called therapy. Anyone can do it. I've got a business plan. I'm going to start a therapy chain.

First I'm going to a party. I shall seek out the sad, the ones clutching a drink in both hands and taking an interest in the DVD collection. I shall sidle over, my sympathetic look worn like a badge, my eyebrows cocked in the correct position. I look like a labrador.

'Have we met?' asks the strange sad one, suddenly nervous. I maintain my silence, my enquiring, sympathetic labradorishness.

'It's just...' the sad one begins, 'it's just that i don't know anyone here, and I don't seem to be any good at mixing, you know?' And they're away. I stand. I lean. I listen. I nod. I shake and I listen.

Once the tears start, as they do, I press my business card into the damp hand, pat them on the head and say, 'just give my secretary a ring.'

From there it snowballs. The sad men and the sad women come and talk to me and feel better and pay me and tell their friends. And I keep their secrets.

Then I branch out. I make lifesized cardboard cut-outs of 'me' and place them in offices in Sydney, Los Angeles and London. Cardboard 'me's in offices in Bangalore and Miami. I charge by the minute. $8.95 a minute to emotionally strip off in front of the sympathetic labrador. The KFC of therapy. We'll all be happier.

I'll be so rich I'll need therapy. I'll go to myself.

Masterful

My bedroom light fizzled then died. I crept to the kitchen for a replacement bulb.
One week and three trips to the supermarket later, I remembered to buy one. The dead bulb had held 60 watts so I bought one containing 100 watts. It should last nearly twice as long.

I stood on my bed. I reached for the light. Raising both hands above one's head does little for the balance. Nevertheless I removed the dead lightbulb. I did this by not letting go of it as I fell. The glass came away nicely in lots of little pieces. Some of them even had blood on them, making a lovely decorative effect on my snowy white bachelor linen.

Close technical inspection revealed that I had indeed removed the bulb. What I hadn't removed was what home handymen call the metal thing that fits into the other thing. I headed to the toolbox for pliers. One week and three trips to the supermarket later I remebered to buy pliers. They had green handles and were made in Taiwan and they didn't cost very much. They said 'Heavy Duty' on the handle. They were awesome.
I stood on the bed again. The thing that was stuck in the other thing came out with a crack. A chunk of the thing it was stuck into broke off. The pliers broke too. Undaunted I inserted the new bulb. It lit up.

A large, painful handful of live electricity unnerves me and as I fell back into my snowy bachelor linen I gracefully turned so as to land on the pliers which now had no handles. Standing and peering into the thing I saw that the bit of the thing I had broken off was the bit of the thing that held the lightbulb onto the thing. It wasn't just a lightbulb I needed. I needed an entire new thing. One week and three trips to the supermarket later I remembered to find out that the supermarket doesn't sell things. I needed a specialist thing shop. I thought of asking someone to help me. Pride said no.

The man in the eletrical shop smiled when I explained in technical terms exactly what I was looking for. It was the smile of one expert to another. In no time at all he unearthed exactly the right thing. 'That's exactly the right thing', I said. He smiled again and the two other people in the shop smiled too. I liked the eletrical thing shop.

Getting home I paused only to fetch a screwdriver from the toolbox.
One week, three trips to the supermarket and one to Placemakers later I had a nifty new set of screwdrivers. They had blue handles and were made in Taiwan. They were awesome. I was ready.

When I detached the broken thing the light shade fell off with it. I put it aside and attached a new thing to a wire. It was easy. I inserted the lightbulb. It stayed inserted. Dismounting the bed I started breathing again and turned the light switch. The light went on. I tried not to smile. I failed badly. I went to put the lamp shade back on. I found that to put the lamp shade back on I needed to detach the new thing.

I went to bed.